


Old habits die hard

by ofinkandeyesbeheld



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Angst, M/M, Post-Kerberos Mission, Shadam, adashi
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-24
Updated: 2018-07-24
Packaged: 2019-06-15 11:20:19
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 486
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15411762
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ofinkandeyesbeheld/pseuds/ofinkandeyesbeheld
Summary: Microfic: Adam, one year post-Kerberos. Things haven't gotten any easier.





	Old habits die hard

**Author's Note:**

> A slightly different take from my work "I Want to Believe"

Adam’s alarm clock goes off at exactly 5:15AM. There’s no one next to him— that space has been empty for the past year.

His chest hurts, and it’s a dull ache that he wakes up with every morning, and it’s worse when he remembers about the Kerberos mission failure. Or, “failure.” Maybe it’s stupid to hold onto hope after hope that Takashi is still out there, out there fighting, out there living. But it’s the only thing that keeps him sane, so even if it’s all a lie, it’s the best he can do, it’s the best he can manage. His panicking has gotten worse—the chest ache, the shortness of breath, the memories of that night, the sheer darkness that blinded him and left nothing but a shell of what he used to be.

_Is this what they call broken heart syndrome?_

There are dark shadows underneath his eyes—so severe that in the beginning a few asked if he’d been getting enough sleep. All he could manage was some gallows joke about throwing himself into his work, with a smile that never really fully reached his eyes. But soon, they stopped asking. It simply became his new normal.

He’s passed out a couple times at his desk, and he wakes up in the middle of the night, feeling a little cold, his glasses askew, his eyes as tired as ever, an ache in his neck that never seems to fully go away. If he isn’t feverishly completing his work and flying and training new cadets, if he isn’t thinking about Takashi, then the rest of his thoughts are full of nothing. Just going through the motions of what’s supposed to be living.

How did it end up like this?

How could it be that it was _Takashi_ , his body ridden with illness, with all the odds stacked against him, was to be the one who lived his life to the fullest?

How was it that _he_ , Adam, was to be the one whose body crumpled, whose skeleton seemed to be made of fatigue and anxiety and stress?

His chest hurts and there’s nothing he can do other than grit his teeth and screw his eyes shut, just barely keeping a moan from escaping his lips. His chest’s getting tighter and his breaths are coming in short, and his mind’s on autopilot, searching for the breathing exercises that Takashi taught him, but he comes up empty every time, because every time he thinks of Takashi, the pain only gets worse.

Think of nothing, nothing, nothing.

Takashi—no, _Shiro_ —is gone.

_You never even had a chance to say goodbye._

He isn’t sure if the feeling in his chest is one of acceptance or guilt.

It doesn’t matter.

He’s mastered the art of feigning everything, and feeling nothing.

He climbs into bed, and he leaves the space next to him empty.

Old habits die hard.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading this far! Even though it's just a microfic. 
> 
> Please leave a comment if you enjoyed this piece!
> 
> Tumblr: @ofinkandgentlelove and @ofinkandeyesbeheld


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